


And the World Turned Upside-Down

by kaeorin



Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Hair Braiding, Miscommunication, Swimming, Tumblr: ImaginexHobbit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-19
Updated: 2015-07-19
Packaged: 2018-04-10 01:41:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4372247
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaeorin/pseuds/kaeorin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Partway through a long and grueling trek with the dwarves, you snap and run naked into the nearest water source to bathe. An array of misunderstandings ensue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And the World Turned Upside-Down

**Author's Note:**

> Partly based on a skinny-dipping imagine from imaginexhobbit that I can’t find anymore, partly based on “Today I went swiming for the first time this summer and decided I had another Hobbit story in me after all.”

You shouldn't have done it, but, at the very least, you probably deserved credit for doing it when you did.

You'd all been riding through the thick woods for days now without any kind of problem. In the very beginning of the trip, you'd taken to riding up front with the grumpy king and the wizard. As such, you knew that the company was making very good time through a very safe part of the woods. Granted, that might not have had anything to do with your decision, but, still, you could have picked a worse time.

Though the breeze around you was borderline chilly, the sun was hot where it beat down on you from between the leaves overhead. For the better part of two days, you'd all been riding parallel to some sort of stream or river: every once in a while, you'd been able to hear the telltale gurgle of water or a soft splash. That was why Thorin—and Bilbo—had allowed you to accompany them: your senses. You often heard or saw things long before any of the others, and thereby you had managed to help the group escape danger several times already. 

But it also meant that you were becoming hyperaware of the smell of your body. As a hobbit—and a woman at that—you had never gone more than a day or two without bathing, and here you'd been travelling with these dwarves for what felt like ages now. At night, you dreamed of large crystal tubs full of sparkling water, lined with bottles of oils and soaps, all free for the taking. Every morning, you awakened to the smell of twelve unwashed dwarves, two unwashed hobbits, and a herd of ponies. 

A fly landed on your knee and gave you a vicious bite before you could slap it away. That was the seventh one since lunch. It was also the final straw.

“I'm sorry, Thorin,” you called as you turned your pony towards the sound of the water. “I just can't take it anymore!”

Bewildered shouts followed behind you as you tore through the underbrush. It was close. It was so close. When you broke through the trees onto a tiny, pebbly beach, you had to stop for a moment and stare. Clearly you'd been riding beside a river, but here it widened enough to calm the current into something lazy and swirling. Rocks sheltered a large part of the river and turned it into more of a pool. Like a pond, but with enough of a current to keep the water sparkling. You leaned forward and kissed the mane of your pony out of sheer happiness and then lowered yourself to the ground. 

At least three of your companions were crashing through the trees behind you. You didn't give them a second thought as you dropped your clothes onto the beach on your way into the water. For as much as the dwarves had been belching, farting, scratching, and adjusting in front of you, surely they could handle a bit of pasty hobbit ass. Bilbo shouted your name, sounding appropriately scandalised, but you could barely hear him over the joyous choir that was singing in your head. You let the icy water rush over your body and the top of your head.

When you came back to the surface, the entirety of the company was standing on the riverbank, looking at you in absolute mystification.

“She's lost her mind,” Bilbo said.

“She's brilliant!” Kili couldn't get his boots off fast enough. When he did, his clothes joined yours on the bank and he came splashing into the water. He shivered loudly, but laughingly, and called to the rest of them. “Come on in! The water's great!”

It didn't take long before his brother joined him, and then not long after that—oh—that was much more of Bofur than you ever needed to see in your entire life. One by one, the dwarves shucked their sweaty, travel-soiled clothes and eased themselves into the water. Soon, the only three left standing on the bank were (naturally) Thorin, Gandalf, and Bilbo. Your fellow hobbit had his arms crossed and was giving you a glare that would have wilted half of your mother's garden.

“What exactly are you thinking?” Thorin demanded. You knew he was talking to you. A bit sheepishly, you crept closer to him until the water just barely touched your navel (you heard Bilbo huff with exasperation, but you wanted to be close enough that you didn't have to shout) and looked up at him. Dwarves were not known for their impressive height, but seeing as you were completely naked and standing quite a bit below him in the water, the effect was there. His eyes fixed intently on yours.

“I was filthy,” you said simply. “I'm not used to long arduous journeys, not like you and your people. I've lasted as long as I could. I heard you talking. We've made good time and there are no threats for miles. I promise I'll scrub quickly, and then we can be on our way again.”

He crossed his arms, clearly considering the situation. You weren't overly frightened: you had long since reached the point where your own stench was more worrisome than what he could do to you. Thorin Oakenshield was intimidating and ill-tempered, but, ultimately, he was not your king.

“Fine,” he spat. “We'll set up camp near here. If you—” And here he raised his eyes to address the rest of the dwarves in the water with you, “Any of you should drown or fall ill from the cold, I'll leave you behind.” His eyes returned to you. “And I'll chain you in the trees to keep watch over them.”

You shrugged. “That sounds fair,” you agreed. He fixed you with one more long, steady glare (surely his eyes hadn't flickered down to your chest, had they?) and then turned to stalk off back into the trees. Gandalf followed, but Bilbo stayed behind. You splashed some water toward him and made him flinch.

“Join us!” 

“You are absolutely indecent,” he said. He was looking everywhere but at you. “What would your mother think?”

“She would think that I am taking a proper interest in personal hygiene, Bilbo. As should you!” But he still wouldn't look at you. You rolled your eyes good-naturedly and waded deeper into the water until it covered your shoulders. “Is that better?”

He peeked quickly at you, and then seemed to relax. “Much better. And I'll not be joining you. I'd prefer to keep my modesty intact, thank you very much.”

“As you wish.” You pulled the bands off the end of each of your braids and worked the hair free with your fingers. “At the end of the night, you will still have your modesty, but at least I won't smell like a pony's arse anymore.” You laughed and disappeared under the water before Bilbo could answer.

It was glorious. Cold enough down around your ankles to make your teeth chatter, but almost warm enough everywhere else. You scrubbed at your skin with your fingernails, coaxing off all the dust, dirt, and grit from travel. You dunked your head under the water and rubbed vigorously at your scalp. Your hair would likely still be greasy when you had finished washing, as you had no soap, but if you fixed it back into a braid, you would hardly even notice it. But more importantly, your scalp might stop itching for a day or two. That, combined with the raucous sounds of the dwarves behind you (clearly more interested in swimming than cleaning, but having a good time nonetheless), had already raised your spirits immensely.

Wait. A thought occurred to you. You jerked yourself out from under the water and turned back toward the beach. Bilbo was still fully-clothed, but at least he had waded into the water to soak his feet. “Bilbo!” You called. He snapped his head up to look at you. “You have soap in your pack, don't you?”

“Oh, no. Absolutely not.” He put his hands up in front of him as though to ward you off. 

“Pleeeease?” You clasped your own hands up beneath your chin, the very picture of childlike innocence. “Please, Bilbo! Soap would be just the thing.”

“That's mine. I'm not sharing it with you, you lunatic. If you wanted some, you should have brought your own.” He was not swayed by your playacting. You lowered your hands.

“I'll give you the last of the seed cakes in my pack,” you offered. Before you'd left home, your mother had made enough food to last you for a month at least. Knowing that it wouldn't all keep, you'd shared most of it with the company those first few nights (earning yourself several new friends in the process), but you'd kept your mother's little cakes all to yourself.

“Cakes?!” Ori sounded nearly as scandalised as Bilbo had been when you'd taken off your clothes. “You've been hiding cakes?”

You ignored them. Bilbo was wavering. He crossed his arms. “You're lying.”

“See for yourself. They're in my pack there, on the pony. There should be three left. Or more even, if Kili hasn't found them all yet.”

“As though I'd steal hobbit food,” Kili called back, but you got the feeling that the look on his face was more about having missed out on the cakes than having been accused of stealing them. Fili took advantage of his momentary distraction to dunk his dark head under the water.

Bilbo went over to your pony to unhook your pack, and brought it to the edge of the water to look inside. His eyebrows shot up. “And I can have all of these, just for giving you some of my soap?”

“Just a sliver of soap, Bilbo. Hardly anything at all!”

He stared thoughtfully at you for a long time, but then finally slunk over to his own pack. You watched him struggle to break his soap into two pieces. He held—of course—the smaller one out to you. It was better than nothing. However he'd been expecting you to take the soap, it certainly hadn't been by wading up out of the water, because as soon as your breasts were exposed again, he huffed and covered his eyes. “Have you no shame? Your mother's going to kill me when she hears about this.”

“Then let's never tell her.” You accepted the soap from him and kissed his cheek. “Thank you, uncle.”

In truth, you did have a bit of shame—a bit. That was why you hurried back into the water and why, as you did, you didn't look up at the dwarves. If you had, you might have noticed that much of their play had stopped, and that too many eyes had been watching your body glisten wetly in the evening sun.

You busied yourself with the soap before it could melt away into the water. Oh, this had most definitely been worth all those cakes. You moaned to yourself as the fresh, clean fragrance of the soap made its way to your nose. Homemade by one of the families in the village, this was the favorite soap of nearly every hobbit in Bag End. It smelled like home. It smelled like warm baths as a child, with your mother laughing and warning you to cover your eyes so she could rinse your hair. 

You made your way to the edge of the pool, where one large rock in particular stood. It stood high enough out of the water to hide you while you stood up out of the water to wash your hair, and was flat enough to hold the soap for you as you dunked your head underwater to rinse it clean. You scrubbed your fingers through it. You had never taken a more exquisite bath than this one, right now.

Slowly, you raised your head out of the water and took a private moment to admire the way your hair fell in a sleek, solid wall between you and the rest of the world. But something was too close: you heard a raspy, almost predatory breath. You shouted something without actually thinking and tried to skitter away while simultaneously swiping your hair out of your face. The rocks beneath your feet were slick with algae, and you felt yourself slip backwards into the water before you could warn the rest of the group of the danger.

When you resurfaced, there was no river monster devouring the dwarves. There was nothing, in fact, except Kili clutching onto the giant rock as laughter tore through him. “You should have heard yourself!” he whooped. “And then bang, you disappeared!” But when you didn't immediately join him in laughter, his own chuckles died in his throat and he looked at you solemnly. He was almost contrite, except for the way his eyes were still sparkling. “What is it?”

“Were you peeping on me?” You crossed your arms in front of your chest. Sure, you'd willingly and joyously exposed yourself to the entire company, but doing that was one thing. Knowing that someone had snuck up behind you to sneak another look, that was something else.

Kili at least had the decency to look a little guilty. “Not on purpose. I just noticed that you'd disappeared and wanted to be sure you were still safe.”

“Well, I am.” Your voice came out sounding angrier than you'd really meant it to. He was probably telling the truth, and you would have appreciated the attention if you'd been sucked down into a whirlpool or something. You made an attempt to soften your face. “Thanks, Kee.” The nickname slipped out by accident. His brother called him that frequently, and the rest of the company did from time to time as well, but even though he was not the prince of your lands, he was still a prince, which surely demanded a certain level of formality. Before you could put together the words of an apology, he grabbed your hand.

“If you've finished bathing, come swim with us. You distract Fili so I can stick this in his hair.” He lifted one hand, the hand that hadn't been clutching the rock, to show you that he was holding a very large and very warty toad. It didn't seem overly concerned with Kili's plan. But Kili sniffed the air once, twice. “What's that smell?”

You sniffed as well, but all you could smell was your soap. He was still holding your hand, and now he lowered his nose to your arm. He gave a great big sniff that tickled against your skin. You tried to pull away, but he only tugged you closer. “What is that?!”

“It's soap. Well, soap and river water, I suppose.” He was still sniffing you. This had gone on too long: he had to be planning something. Sure enough, he looked up quickly and just as you were noticing the stunned look on his face, it shifted into something sneaky and he threw the toad at you. You caught it with a yelp (poor thing) and made sure it was placed carefully on the giant rock before taking off after the incorrigible dwarven prince. He swam faster than you, but you were on a mission, so it didn't take long before you were throwing your arms around his neck from behind to try to drag him down into the water.

Which might have worked better if he hadn't been leading you into shallow water. He grabbed your arms and rose up high out of the water. All you could do was wrap your legs around his waist to support your weight and howl with anger. He laughed, spinning around wildly like a dog chasing its tail.

“Quite the spirited pack you've got there, boy!” you heard Bombur call out to him as you were drawing in another breath. 

“Aye, she can't hold much but it's an adventure just to wear her,” he shouted back. This simply would not stand. Rather than yelling anymore (because clearly that didn't bother him), you moved in closer and ran your tongue up the side of his neck, then took his earlobe between your teeth.

“Unhand me, or I'm taking this with me,” you growled, biting down just enough to threaten. He'd have to let go of your arms if you wanted to lower yourself into the water.

His reaction was a complete shock to you: not only did he let you go, but he all but flung you into the water some distance away from him. You came to the surface coughing and sputtering. Ori hovered nearby.

“Are you hurt?” He asked. You shook your head once as you focused on clearing the rest of the water out of your lungs.

“No, I'm not hurt. Thank you. It's nice to see that there are _some_ dwarves who have a bit of _consideration for others_.” You spat a fountain of water in Kili's direction. He had a strange expression on his face, but you turned away from him before he could meet your eyes. 

You swam until the golden sunset had been replaced by the long shadows and blue calm of twilight. Most of the other dwarves, particularly the older ones, had gotten out of the water long ago to go help set up camp. Bilbo still had not joined you. Kili was still avoiding you. Ori's teeth were chattering. You'd stayed in the water for too long.

When you finally waded out onto the beach to where you remembered having left your clothes, there was nothing there. No, that's not quite true: you recognized the tunics and trousers than Fili and Kili had been wearing, but there was nothing beneath them. Dammit, another prank? It was getting too cold now to be wandering around wet and naked. 

“You've gone too far this time Kili, son of Dis!” You shouted towards the water with your hands on your hips. He turned his head toward you, but looked away almost immediately. Fili, however, shot you a questioning look and kept looking until you turned away with a growl. Fine. Wherever he'd hidden your clothes, you'd have the last laugh. You had an extra set in your pack. Granted, it was your only extra set, but it was better than letting him make you walk around searching for your other ones. You dried off roughly with a towel you'd found beside the pile of dwarven clothing and yanked your clean clothes out of your pack. You dressed right there on the beach, feeling no shame, even when Ori made his way out of the water. 

“I'm sorry, I think I used your towel,” you said sincerely. He shook his head without really looking at you.

“It's not mine. I didn't even bring one. This is how I prefer to dry off.” And then he began to shake himself wildly and enthusiastically. You couldn't help but laugh. It didn't seem to be much better than using a towel. He beamed at you. You shared a quiet moment together before you turned your attention towards Fili and Kili. They were the last ones still in the water.

“Do you think they'll drown if I leave them here by themselves?” You asked thoughtfully. Ori laughed.

“Oh, they're young, but they're strong swimmers. They'll be fine. Do you want to go see what they've made for dinner?”

“Ori, I would like nothing more.” You fastened your pack back onto your pony, laid the towel out to dry on a rock not too far from the water's edge (it wasn't likely that they both hid your clothing, and you'd hate to get revenge on the innocent brother), and you and Ori made your way back through the woods to camp, the smell of the cookfire leading the way.

***

Dinner was a mess of fresh fish ( _“I caught them upstream from your antics,”_ Thorin had said in a voice just angry enough to force you to stifle your excitement at seeing fresh food) cooking on sticks near the fire. They weren't half done, which made you wonder if perhaps Thorin wasn't much of a fisherman. He looked tired. Why hadn't he joined the rest of the company in the water? The answer came to you quickly—and uncomfortably. Because he'd had to do most of the work setting up camp. You hadn't thought of that. Maybe it would have been smarter to convince him to stop for the night, and then worry about getting clean after you'd put in your fair share of work.

You sat on a log near the fire, not too far from Thorin himself. He was gazing into the fire, but you knew he wasn't really seeing it. Was he thinking of Erebor? Thinking of the family and people he had left? Was he regretting having brought you along in the first place?

To distract yourself from your guilt, you opened your pack and pulled out your comb. Your hair, while clean, felt like a tangled mess. You brushed it slowly and carefully, wincing every time your comb snagged a knot. Once or twice, you felt the king's eyes on you, but you didn't look back at him. It might invite him to ridicule you for such rituals. When at last your hair was smooth again, you set about working it back into a braid. You weren't very good at braiding your own hair. Someone else's? Easy as pie. You could work such pieces of art into even the king's wild mane, but you feared you were just working your own into knots again.

And he was watching you. When you looked over at him, you saw that he seemed to be fighting a smile. One corner of his lips twitched, then the other. Your struggles amused him. You tried not to roll your eyes at the thought. Fine. Let him laugh. At least he wasn't yelling at you for being so prissy. All you wanted to do was get your hair up and out of your face so you wouldn't have to worry about it on the journey. That wasn't prissy, that was...practical. “I don't suppose you'd be willing to help me out here, would you?” You finally asked, having grown desperate. Thorin's eyes widened and his mouth dropped open. He looked rather like the fish that were currently cooking over the fire.

“I'll help you, lass!” That was Bofur, standing nearby with a suspiciously-large grin on his face.

“I think you'd better ask Bilbo to help you with that, my dear,” Gandalf spoke up. He seemed amused at the king's reaction as well. “Unless you'd like to create an uproar.”

What did that even mean? Fine. You stood up and walked away, leaving Thorin and the wizard to carry on without you.

Bilbo knew how to braid hair even better than your mother did, but when you were younger, he'd threatened dire consequences if you ever told her that. When you'd asked for his help, he'd merely gestured to the ground between his legs. Perhaps he was still angry at you for your immodesty at the river. So you quietly handed him the comb and sat between your legs. He didn't speak, just started to comb your hair out again.

“I took the liberty of washing your clothes for you,” he said in a low voice. “They're drying by the fire.”

Oops. You lowered your head for a moment, until a gentle tug reminded you to raise it again. “Thank you, Uncle. Even though that means I owe Kili an apology.”

“What have you done this time?”

“Nothing bad. I just...when they were gone, I thought he'd gone and hid them. I yelled at him.”

“Now, I wonder where you get that temper from.” You could hear the smile in his voice. Your mother was not known for her patience. She most often expressed her firey temper through the fabric she wove and turned into clothing: bright, fierce colors that were greatly valued even beyond Bag End, but when she lost her patience with another hobbit, it rarely ended well. 

You laughed at the gentle teasing, but then fell quiet. Your mother. Your gentle, strong mother. You wondered what she was doing right now. Was she reading? Weaving? You hoped she wasn't alone. Bilbo tapped on your shoulder, and you started to hand him a band for the end of your braid, but he nudged it away. No, he was handing you something. Half of a seed cake. You took it with a grateful smile and nibbled on it as he worked.

Even before Bilbo had finished, you heard familiar voices and footsteps approaching. So neither of them had drowned. You were vaguely relieved that Thorin wouldn't have to chain you to the trees, but also somewhat disappointed. That meant you'd be leaving that beautiful little pool behind tomorrow. One of them—you couldn't tell their boots apart but didn't dare raise your head and interrupt Bilbo's braiding—approached you. He stopped some distance away.

“You left this in the river.” It was Kili's voice, and it sounded...tight. Was he angry with you? You needed to apologize for yelling at him, but your outburst hadn't seemed like something he'd hold a grudge over. Anyway, there was another level of emotion in his voice. He sounded upset. Before you could ask him what it was, he dropped it in the dirt in front of you, turned on the ball of his foot, and stalked away.

“What was that about?” He tapped your shoulder, this time certainly for one of your bands. You handed it over.

“I don't know.” You wanted to get up and follow him, but you couldn't very well go with your hair half-done. All you could do was sit there and watch as Kili rolled out his bedroll, laid down, and covered himself with his blanket. It was far too early to go to sleep, and he hadn't even eaten yet. You felt your eyebrows furrow. Had something happened after you'd left the river? The second braid seemed to take forever, but when Bilbo finally tightened the band around it, you shot up to your feet and went over to him.

“Hey,” you said sharply. He didn't open his eyes. You nudged him with one foot. “Hey. I know you're awake. You always roll onto your back once you fall asleep.” Oops. That was probably revealing too much.

“How would you know that?” Kili didn't open his eyes, didn't even crack one eye open to look at you. But he sounded interested. That was a start. You sat in the dirt beside him and crossed your legs.

“I didn't sleep much when we first started out.” The truth seemed like a good enough idea. “I was homesick. Still am a little, actually.” That was definitely revealing too much. He kept his eyes closed as he turned onto his back. 

Message received. 

You started to get up, but then he spoke again: “What do you want?”

You paused. “Well, I guess first I should apologize. On the beach, I assumed you hid my clothes as a stupid prank, so I yelled at you, but it turned out that U—” But you caught yourself just before calling him Uncle Bilbo. You were trying to keep that a secret. Thorin knew, of course, and Gandalf, but you didn't want to have to listen to anyone tell you that the only reason you were here was because of your uncle. Anyway, he wasn't really an uncle, not by blood. Just by...accident. He lived nearby, and he'd helped your mother out a lot many years ago, just after your father had been killed. “Er, it turned out that Bilbo washed them for me and brought them to the fire to dry.” Kili may have snorted when you'd said Bilbo's name, or else he really was falling asleep, and it was just a snore. “So...I'm sorry.”

Aside from that stupid little snore, Kili hadn't made any other noises. You wanted to get up and storm away again, but your curiosity won out over your temper. “And I also want to know why you're being such an arse?”

His eyes shot open at that, blazing with indignance. “I'm not being an arse!”

“Are so! First you threw me into the river like I'm garbage, and now you're being an arse!”

“Maybe you're the one being an arse!” He turned onto his side, facing away from you, but then seemed to think better of it and sat up. “I threw you in the water because you licked my ear!”

“I licked your ear because you wouldn't put me down!” Your voice was getting too loud, too shrill. It had already attracted the attention of some of the dwarves, but you were too angry to care. “And I didn't lick your ear, I licked your neck! I bit your ear!”

He sputtered for a moment, but thrust his finger right into your face. “Well—And I _did_ put you down! And now you're angry with me about it!”

“Because you almost drowned me!” Oooh, you could just reach out and throttle him. If only his uncle wasn't watching...

His face softened for a minute. He almost looked concerned. “Were you hurt?”

“N-no.” No, this was weird. You were arguing. He wasn't supposed to look at you like that, with his eyebrows creased together and his eyes big and...soft. “But that's not the point. The point...” It was gone. You couldn't remember what you were angry about. You sighed. “Forget it. This is foolish.” You struggled to your feet (you'd forgotten how tiring swimming could be) and stepped over Kili to walk away.

“Right, go back to your lover.” He'd muttered it under his breath. Any other member of the group probably wouldn't have been able to hear it, but you were...well, you. You spun around to look at him.

“What are you talking about now?” You demanded. You should have just let it go. There'd just been something in the way he'd spat the words at you that wouldn't allow you to let it go. 

“Nothing. You said it yourself, forget it. It's foolish.” He sounded bitter, and...betrayed. How could this one stupid dwarf make you feel so many things at once? 

You put your hands on your hips. “I want to know what you meant. Who, exactly, is my lover, according to the great all-knowing Kili? Is it Bofur? Thorin? Ori?” (From somewhere behind you, you heard the young dwarf choke a bit, and start to protest his innocence.) “Tell me, Kili. Or is this because I took my clothes off in front of everybody? Because, let me tell you, you lot have done plenty else in my presence, so I don't exactly see how—” 

In one fluid motion, Kili had pulled himself to his feet and clasped his hand against your mouth. “Shut up,” he said. His chest was heaving, but he didn't sound angry. More...hurt. “Do not treat me like a fool. Sitting there in the middle of everything. Everyone in camp now knows that your heart belongs to Bilbo.” 

His words shocked you into silence for what seemed an eternity. Someone behind you—Thorin? Gandalf?—had shouted Kili's name, but no one approached the two of you. Finally, laughter bubbled up in your chest, and you had to peel the prince's hand off of your mouth so you could laugh. You expected Kili to start laughing along with you, but he remained as still as the grave. The realization that he was serious made you stop laughing. “Bilbo? Kili, Bilbo's my family. He is not my lover.” For Bilbo's sake, you managed to keep from shuddering.

He seemed uncertain now, and less hurt. “But... Why else would you wear such elaborate courting braids?” He raised one hand to touch your hair but pulled away as though you'd burned him. Gandalf was definitely chuckling. No one else made a sound.

“They're not...” What an absolutely ridiculous misunderstanding. You wanted to throw your arms around Kili and hug him tightly, but you refrained just in case he wanted to throw you again. You were rather close to the fire. “Not every braid is a courting braid, Kee. Sometimes they're just regular old braids to keep a hobbit's hair out of her face while she's riding.” You kind of hated that everyone was looking at the two of you, but there was nothing to be done for that now. He wasn't responding. With your heart beating loudly in your ears, you reached up to take a thin chunk of his hair in your fingers. “For example, if I were to just...braid this, here, that wouldn't necessarily be a courting braid, would it?”

He closed his fingers around your wrist and gave a little shake of his head. “Don't,” he said. His voice sounded strange. Faraway. “Unless you mean it, then don't...”

You met his eyes. They'd gone wide and pleading, and fixed on you with an intensity that made your throat feel dry. He looked frightened. You nodded without even meaning to, and he loosened his grip enough to let you work his hair into a braid. “There,” you said, wincing at the way your voice cracked.

Behind you, someone whistled, and then someone else made a cheerful whooping sound. Bofur was the first to speak.

“Does this mean she can't bathe with us anymore?”


End file.
